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Language of fungi by Debbie Lee
Language of fungi
by Debbie Lee
Mycelium colony
Neuronal spiking
The mycelium of a fungal colony may use electrical impulses to communicate, which could be considered a “language”. The impulses vary in amplitude, frequency, and duration, and can be grouped into “words”. Mycelium acts as an organic network of telephone lines, sending signals to different parts of the fungus. The impulses can be modified in response to different stimuli, similar to how neurons operate in a brain. The patterns of electrical impulses could be the basis of a fungal language. Different fungal species may have distinct electrical signaling patterns, suggesting a unique “language” for each species. The average word length in the fungal language may be similar to the average word length in some human languages.
In his paper “Language of fungi derived from their electrical spiking activity”, Andrew Adamatzky applies quantitative analysis of voltage fluctuations in fungal mycelia. The report concludes that the patterns of electrical fluctuations can be grouped into “words” analogous to those found in human languages. Adamatzky’s 2022 study groups spikes into words, thereby providing a linguistic and information complexity analysis of the fungal spiking activity. This confirms a secret language of mushrooms: How fungi use electricity to speak.
Further reading:
‘Language of fungi derived from their electrical spiking activity’, 2022, Adamatzky, A., Royal Society Open Science, available: https://doi.org/10.1098/rsos.211926
Author bio:
Debbie Lee (@lee_debbie):
Writing from places light and dark,
awkward data nerd,
elegant word nerd,
dreaming in colour,
clumsily balancing love, hope,
kindness with pragmatic realism.
Read more sciku by Debbie: ‘Technomancy’ and ‘Toxic Male’.
Lily Delivered by James Penha
when my dog vomits
by James Penha
he’ll eat the barf but not so
one primeval fish
An amateur fossil-hunter in Denmark found vomit, embedded in chalk, composed of undigestible sea-lilies likely thrown up by a fish some 66 million years ago.
Further reading:
‘‘An unusual find’: 66m-year-old animal vomit discovered in Denmark’, 2025, France-Presse, A., The Guardian, available: https://www.theguardian.com/science/2025/jan/28/an-unusual-find-66m-year-old-animal-vomit-discovered-in-denmark
Author bio:
Expat New Yorker James Penha (he/him 🌈) has lived for the past three decades in Indonesia. Nominated for Pushcart Prizes in fiction and poetry, his work is widely published in journals and anthologies. His newest chapbook of poems, American Daguerreotypes, is available for Kindle. Penha edits TheNewVerse.News, an online journal of current-events poetry. You can find out more about James’ poetry on his website https://jamespenha.com and catch up with him on BlueSky @jamespenha.bsky.social
Supersonic Winds by Martina Matijević
Supersonic winds
by Martina Matijević
Strong enough to blow our star
Sun feeling ghosted
WASP-127b located 520 light-years away, experiences equatorial winds reaching supersonic speeds of 33,000 km/h, the fastest ever measured on a planet. This gas giant orbits its host star every four days, enduring temperatures over 1,127 Celsius degrees. The discovery was made with the CRIRES+.
Further reading:
‘Extreme supersonic winds measured on planet outside our Solar System’, 2025, Science Daily, available: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2025/01/250121125759.htm
‘CRIRES+ transmission spectroscopy of WASP-127 b – Detection of the resolved signatures of a supersonic equatorial jet and cool poles in a hot planet’, 2025, Nortmann, L., et al., Astronomy & Astrophysics, available: https://doi.org/10.1051/0004-6361/202450438
Author bio:
Matijević has orbited the Sun 23 times, making her 23 years old in Earth’s timekeeping system. A science enthusiast and poet, her work has appeared in 5-7-5 Haiku Journal, View from Atlantis and Awen. You can discover more of her poetry here: https://tinamatijev.wixsite.com/martina-matijevi
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